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I don't like the VF-29 much. Not so much because of its aesthetics (though those aren't great) but because of it's design history. Someone on the Macross World Forums gave an overview on some of what one of the publications said about the design (caveat -the poster said he'd been skim reading the material). Supposedly it had an incredibly fast development cycle because it uses some VF-25 systems and some new systems based on fold quartz. It's also supposed to have capabilities comparable to some of the FAST pack equipped VF-25s in it's base form.

So let's see:

-The time period between the films is unlikely to be more than a few months. I seriously doubt the VF-29 was developed in that timeframe, it would have to be under development before then. Why would the VF-25s manufacturer be so far along on developing a VF-25 replacement when the VF-25 itself is still in what essentially amounts to its Operational Evaluation?
-Even though the VF-25 may be in what essentially amount to an Operational Evaluation, there are enough of them to suggest that the basic design has been committed to.
-Why not just stick the new fold quartz systems in the VF-25 and rush those into full production? Why such a heavily altered basic design?
-Versatility was paramount to the VF-25s design philosophy, and it's various options show it to be highly versatile. This was also the excuse for why it looks so much like the VF-1. So why the sudden 180 in design philosophy from emphasizing modular add ons to emphasizing built in systems?
-This basically marks the VF-25 as obsolete before it's even in service. Granted the VF-27 kind of did the same thing, but it at least had the excuse of being a super fighter that could kill a non cyborg pilot. The VF-25 is iconic for Macross Frontier in a way comparable to how the original VF-1 was iconic for the original Macross. I don't want this new thing taking away from it.

Here's to hoping it's just a merchandising attempt and won't actually show up in the movie itself. I don't remember seeing it in the trailer.

It's YF-29 indicating it is a experimental prototype.

Also notice the development time of the YF-24 and YF-24 Evolution.

Spoiler for VF lineage chart:

The YF-24 was jointly developed by Shinsei Industry and General Galaxy shortly after the YF-19 and YF-21 went through the Super Nova competition. It didn't go for mass production. More of a proof of concept with the new magnetic based transformation system. Mass production models besides the VF-25 and VF-27 use mechanical transformation systems. Seventeen years later (2057) one of the prototypes, YF-24 Evolution, were fitted with the Inertia Store Converter and became the forefather of the VF-25, VF-27 and YF-29.

I've always loved Kawamori's forward-swept-wing designs, but the YF-29 has two additiona thursters that, from an aesthetics point of view, seem unnecessary and ruins what could have been potentially a beautiful aircraft.

On a side note, it was quite a disappointment that the VF-19 was not part of the Frontier fighting force in the TV-series. I've always thought they would be part of the military elite, fighting alongside the VF-171, but alas, that did not happen. A sub-plot involving military rivalry between the military and the SMS would have been a great addition. Unfortunately, Frontier's armed forces were given a less-than-competant portrayal in the series and pale in comparison to the performance that is the SMS.

And I wanted to see more Zentradi action in the series, but that also did not happen... sigh. Of course, many people wanted this series to last longer than 25 episodes... oh nevermind...

I've always loved Kawamori's forward-swept-wing designs, but the YF-29 has two additiona thursters that, from an aesthetics point of view, seem unnecessary and ruins what could have been potentially a beautiful aircraft.

On a side note, it was quite a disappointment that the VF-19 was not part of the Frontier fighting force in the TV-series. I've always thought they would be part of the military elite, fighting alongside the VF-171, but alas, that did not happen. A sub-plot involving military rivalry between the military and the SMS would have been a great addition. Unfortunately, Frontier's armed forces were given a less-than-competant portrayal in the series and pale in comparison to the performance that is the SMS.

And I wanted to see more Zentradi action in the series, but that also did not happen... sigh. Of course, many people wanted this series to last longer than 25 episodes... oh nevermind...

- Tak

Same here, there were plenty of Zentradi on Frontier, but aside from the Pixies we really never see any of the once Proud Warrior Race fighting. The complete lack of the VF-19 in the series bothered me too. I mean I can understand why they didn't put it for the typical grunt fighter because they had to get blown away left and right for the story, and doing that to the VF-19 would have been just a disgrace. Still they did throw together a VF-19 model for the air show vids, they could have painted up a VF-19 for a scene like Machida's. Alas.

Same here, there were plenty of Zentradi on Frontier, but aside from the Pixies we really never see any of the once Proud Warrior Race fighting.

Enh...I don't think they were ever a "Proud Warrior Race." They're not 50-foot Klingons, they're cultureless people who only fight because it's what they've always done. Nothing proud or noble about it.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lancel

The complete lack of the VF-19 in the series bothered me too. I mean I can understand why they didn't put it for the typical grunt fighter because they had to get blown away left and right for the story, and doing that to the VF-19 would have been just a disgrace. Still they did throw together a VF-19 model for the air show vids, they could have painted up a VF-19 for a scene like Machida's. Alas.

Enh...I don't think they were ever a "Proud Warrior Race." They're not 50-foot Klingons, they're cultureless people who only fight because it's what they've always done. Nothing proud or noble about it.

Thats funny, in the original series, Vrlitwhai was completely baffled by the idea of a society where its men & women aren't warriors. He thought this was simply not the way for anyone to live.

And even after the Zentradi were pacified, riots amongst the Zentradi population due to the lack of war caused such an immense problem that non-micloned Zents were eventually banned from Earth's surface.

Likewise, during the incident at Galia 4, the Zentradi who mutinied resorted to their past as a justification for their actions. I need not remind you what was uttered by the rebels, but clearly they were very proud of their past as a warrior-race. Even Klan once mentioned that because she was a Zentradi, she cannot let go of grievances and insisted on her vengeance against the Vajra for the death of Michael.

A warrior culture is still a culture, it might not be a sophisticated culture, it might not be able to produce 'entertainment' as we know it, but it is still a culture & tradition. For the Zentradi, being warriors was their culture & tradition, they certainly did not despise it, and most embrace it all too well.

The YF-24 was jointly developed by Shinsei Industry and General Galaxy shortly after the YF-19 and YF-21 went through the Super Nova competition. It didn't go for mass production. More of a proof of concept with the new magnetic based transformation system. Mass production models besides the VF-25 and VF-27 use mechanical transformation systems. Seventeen years later (2057) one of the prototypes, YF-24 Evolution, were fitted with the Inertia Store Converter and became the forefather of the VF-25, VF-27 and YF-29.

The idea that preliminary work on a potential successor was being done "on paper" when the YF-19 was still in testing isn't that out there. The idea that there was a flying prototype of the successor design at that time is. Also note that two years would be an awfully short development cycle for a system as sophisticated as the VF-25 although I guess it was building pretty heavily on the YF-24.

The VF-29 has an awful lot of core technology in common with the VF-25 for a design that's supposed to be its successor though don't you think? On the other hand however the design philosophy seems to be completely different for some reason. Again, the VF-25 was basically developed to be a good "base platform" that could be fulfill a lot of different mission using various add ons while the VF-29 seems to emphasize built in systems. Such a shift in philosophy would seem to reflect the VF-25s design philosophy is flawed, yet it seems to me that the VF-25's approach has proved quite effective in practice.

Then again I do have to admit being a big fan of the VF-25 and thinking it's a beautiful design. I've got a model of one sitting on a shelf above my desk for a reason.

Thats funny, in the original series, Vrlitwhai was completely baffled by the idea of a society where its men & women aren't warriors. He thought this was simply not the way for anyone to live.

And even after the Zentradi were pacified, riots amongst the Zentradi population due to the lack of war caused such an immense problem that non-micloned Zents were eventually banned from Earth's surface.

Likewise, during the incident at Galia 4, the Zentradi who mutinied resorted to their past as a justification for their actions. I need not remind you what was uttered by the rebels, but clearly they were very proud of their past as a warrior-race. Even Klan once mentioned that because she was a Zentradi, she cannot let go of grievances and insisted on her vengeance against the Vajra for the death of Michael.

A warrior culture is still a culture, it might not be a sophisticated culture, it might not be able to produce 'entertainment' as we know it, but it is still a culture & tradition. For the Zentradi, being warriors was their culture & tradition, they certainly did not despise it, and most embrace it all too well.

The idea that preliminary work on a potential successor was being done "on paper" when the YF-19 was still in testing isn't that out there. The idea that there was a flying prototype of the successor design at that time is. Also note that two years would be an awfully short development cycle for a system as sophisticated as the VF-25 although I guess it was building pretty heavily on the YF-24.

The VF-29 has an awful lot of core technology in common with the VF-25 for a design that's supposed to be its successor though don't you think? On the other hand however the design philosophy seems to be completely different for some reason. Again, the VF-25 was basically developed to be a good "base platform" that could be fulfill a lot of different mission using various add ons while the VF-29 seems to emphasize built in systems. Such a shift in philosophy would seem to reflect the VF-25s design philosophy is flawed, yet it seems to me that the VF-25's approach has proved quite effective in practice.

Then again I do have to admit being a big fan of the VF-25 and thinking it's a beautiful design. I've got a model of one sitting on a shelf above my desk for a reason.

Yet just about every truly successful jet fighter design of the last few decades was either designed to be a multirole fighter or modified to be a multirole fighter.

Note too just how much the different FAST Pack options alter the VF-25s configuration. The Super Pack for instance places emphasis on agility while the Armour Pack offers immense firepower and protection for heavy assault missions.

Then you have the Tornado Pack from the movies. That one pretty much turns the VF-25 into a completely different fighter. And while I suppose I can see the YF-29 managing to match the Super Pack's capabilities decently well I think the Tornado Pack is a whole different kettle of fish. I don't remember with certainty which forum this was pointed out on but there are several advantages the Tornado Pack ought to have over the YF-29. It should be more maneuverable (at least in space) since it has those swivelling wingtip engines. It's beam cannons are larger and have a much wider field of fire (including to the rear). Its micro missile launchers are located in those huge add on wings rather than in parts of the base machine that are already crammed with other equipment -just imagine how that affects ammunition capacity (and remember that the Tornado Pack equipped VF-25 can carry those massive underwing pods as well).

I also think that the modular philosophy of the VF-25 would make it relatively easy to upgrade compared to a design that had a lot of its capabilities embedded into the basic design.

I think the discussion is conflating two similar, but separate things: Zentradi "war urges" and the idea of Zentradi being "proud warriors". Yes, Zentradi might have the inborn urge to fight and fight, but that does not mean they are like Klingons or other similar things.

If we're considering "proud warriors" in the most literal sense, a few Zentradi are. We have seen individuals like Kamjin and Milia, who derive enjoyment and pride from their successes and kills. Even Britai enjoys a job well done. But you have to have more than that to be a "proud warrior race" like in many SF settings.

To do that, they have to have ritual, ceremony, an ethos, an overriding, philosophical justification for why they do what they do. The Zentradi don't have that. They don't have medals or ticker-tape parades or Veteran's Day. They just fight and fight and fight until they die. Even if they enjoy fighting, the bare fact is that they didn't choose it. While some Zentradi chose a personal pride in their accomplishments, it's hollow if it came from a world where they had no choice.

This is why I find it hard to put the Zentradi and the Klingons in the same boat. Other warrior races have more of a life to them than the Zentradi do. Even when Exsedol tells the miclones that "to do battle is to live life", it seems hollow when there is no glory or honour, just the next battle.

Now, the word "culture" has multiple meanings which muddy these waters a bit. The Zentradi may have a culture if you define "culture" as the day-to-day activities and rules of a group, but Macross defines "culture" as something that contains songs, love, and (relative) freedom. It is set up in opposite to the Zentradi antagonists.

One of the major arcs of the series was the Zentradi discovering there was more to life and moving towards that. On a fundamental level, the human lifestyle and the Zentraedi lifestyle are therefore not equivalent.

Because of this, I think it's better to show Zentradi characters who aren't warriors, to support the themes of the original series. That's the kind of "Zentradi action" I want to see.

Secondly, Macross isn't clear on how much Zentradi "war urges" effect their populace post-SW1. Many of the examples you cite, and other potential explorations, could have other explanations, in whole or part.

*Kamjin gains followers because the Zentradi simply *can't* adjust, but in ways analogonous to humans who leave prison have trouble living on "the outside" or war veterans have difficutly returning to human society. It's not necessarily that they always want to destroy, but that they just can't, for personal reasons, deal with a world that is so different from the one they knew, even if they *thought* they could.

**Being naturally-sized could be outlawed because of danger that stems not from war urges, but from adjustment failures and personal desire to fight. But furthermore, it could have been done because naturally-sized Zentradi just require too much resources to support, especially if they can reproduce at natural size. I can see this being made the law just for a matter of space.

***Some Zentradi stay in the military because they chose to, not because their DNA tells them so. They just like being warriors, and think their people are good at it because of this.

Free will is hard to determine for a genetically-engineered race, but also it's hard to determine for humanity, so there's that. Personally, I think it's contradictory to the themes of Macross, not to mention a bit depressing, to interpret that the majority of allied Zentradi are always going to be hard to handle, or still primarily define themselves as warriors. If that is the case, why tell the story of SDFM?

Thought this would be a good place to raise a question that’s been bugging me a bit lately. That’s what to make of those big things the VF-25 has mounted under its arms when mounting an Armour Pack. They don’t correspond to anything I’ve seen in the published specs (granted those specs often don’t match series visuals that well). They look like large bore weapons of some kind and in fact bear a strong resemblance to one of the arm mounted guns the YF-19 tested in the second episode of Macross Plus. However if the Armoured VF-25 actually mounted arm guns powerful enough to one shot an old Destroid Monster you’d think Ozma would think to try using them against some of the large type Vajra he fought (granted we never saw him use the swivel guns on his boosters either).

Actually this ties into a larger issue I’ve been dealing with as a Macross fanfic writer as to how to treat weapon systems the VF-25s are listed as having but never actually seem to use in series (like the 25mm guns that are mounted near the engine intakes in fighter mode). Though I’m a bit unsure whether that larger issue is an appropriate one to discuss in this thread.

I don't think the "arm guards" are just there to provide armour protection. If they are their coverage is very limited, besides which they don't look like simple armour plates. I think those parts serve some additional function of some kind, it's mainly a matter of deciding what that function is. The barrels sticking out of them do bear a strong resemblance to the large bore arm gun tested by the YF-19 in a brief scene in Macross Plus although I personally don't like the idea of them being some kind of high powered weapons that much due to the fact that the Armoured VF-25 already packs so much weaponry.

Sometimes it seems like Gundam maintenance crews build new robots out of the scraps of the old ones for lack of spare parts. How they manage to actually improve on the performance with each new model is one of the Great Mysteries.

Here's a question that's been bugging me for a bit - is the main gun on Battle Frontier different from previous models? Because the Frontier is the only ship so far to have the main gun open up in order to fire (neither Battle 7 or Battle Galaxy does this); and in the movie, the gun module seems to be huge in comparison to previous ships (it's fired like a bazooka, rather than a rifle/carbine). I just did a frame by frame advance of the relevant bits, and all three times where the Frontier's gun goes off, it fires from the big glowy bit that swings down from behind the regular gun ports.

Also, is there some kind of volume fudging going on with the transformation on the New Macross class? No one ever made a transformable toy, and I've only seen one fanmade 3D model of it, which I can't lay hands on to check... it looks to me like the butt of the rifle would conflict with the chest section, since the rifle appears to be longer than the "arm".

(attempting to build my own 3D mesh of the New Macross, and it's not going very well...)